The Roman or Latin alphabet is the alphabet used to write many modern-day languages. It is the most used alphabet and writing system in the world today. It is the official script for nearly all the languages of Western Europe, and of some Eastern Europe languages. It is also used by some non-European languages such as Turkish, Vietnamese, Malay language, Somali, Swahili, and Tagalog. It is an alternative writing system for languages such as Hindi, Urdu, Serbian, and Bosnian.

The alphabet is a writing system which evolved from a western variety of the Greek alphabet. It was the Etruscans who first developed it after borrowing the Greek alphabet, and the Romans developed it further. The sounds of some letters changed, some letters were lost and gained, and several writing styles ('hands') developed. Two such styles were combined into one script with upper and lower case letters ('capitals' and 'small letters'). Modern capital letters differ only slightly from their Roman counterparts. There are few regional variations.

Nearly all languages using the Roman alphabet include diacritics, which are symbols found above or below the letters, for things such as tones (English is the only major language that does not have any of these marks, at least not for native words). The basic alphabet uses the following letters:

Writing a language in Roman letters is called Romanization. Many people who do not speak the language read a romanized version to know roughly how the words will sound, even if that is not the normal way to write the language.